A few days later, having heard that the Bishop purposed paying her a little visit at Batala, she wrote to him direct:—
‘Batala, Oct. 20, 1887.
Revered Bishop,—Though I know not whether this will reach you till after your return from Batala, I cannot forbear thanking you for your affectionate letter, and intention of gratifying me by visiting my simple little Missionary home. I received your letter at Amritsar, having—for a wonder—left Batala to be present at the wedding of dear old Mr. Newton’s grandson at Ludhiana. This has occasioned a little delay in my replying. Mr. Corfield also was absent, having gone to bring his wife from Dharmsala; but we expect him to-morrow morning, and then he shall know your wishes. I think that you will find the Ghurub-i-Aftab very quiet. You will see visitors or not, just as you please,—only give a hint of your wishes. When the dear Lord’s Servants honour me with a visit, I say that they gild my floors.
‘If it be not presumptuous in me to say so, I would express my feeling that there is something beautiful and elevating in the idea of one who was a Missionary before he was a Bishop, becoming a Missionary after leaving his Bishopric; laying down the crozier and mitre, to take up the simple Evangelist’s staff. Perhaps, my honoured Friend,—if permitted to call you so,—your grandest work is yet to come.—Yours with affectionate respect,
C. M. Tucker.
‘P.S.—Please offer my affectionate and grateful remembrances to dear Mrs. French.’
The Bishop’s visit came about, as hoped for; and it was a great pleasure to Miss Tucker to receive him. Although they might differ on certain points, they were one in absolute love and obedience to the same Lord and Master; and each thoroughly appreciated, thoroughly delighted in, the whole-hearted and single devotion of the other. In some respects the two were much alike. There was in both, as Dr. Weitbrecht has said, ‘a fiery impatience of difficulty or delay which sometimes led to mistakes.’ In both also there was a remarkable upliftedness,—if the word is permissible,—an absorption in things spiritual, which made earthly matters seem altogether unimportant by comparison.
The one drawback to Miss Tucker’s enjoyment was that she gave up to the Bishop her own little ‘house,’—and such changes had at her time of life grown to be somewhat of a trial. But she would not hear of a gentleman being permitted to sleep in ‘Sonnenschein,’ with the younger ladies,—not even her beloved and revered Bishop!! She had not perhaps entirely even yet lost sight of her old favourite idea of a home for Mission Miss Sahibas, into which a man’s foot might not enter. At all events, she decided to sleep there herself, and to give up her little Sunset home to the Bishop. Which she did.
‘It was beautiful to see them together,’ Miss Dixie has said, when speaking of this visit, which lasted somewhat under a week. The Bishop and Miss Tucker went about in company, attended church together, and had many a long talk,—both of them white-haired, fragile in look, worn out with heavy toil, aged beyond their years. Both would be so utterly absorbed in the subject under discussion, as to see nothing around, to hear nothing that went on. There was about each of them a remarkable Other-worldliness, to use a curious term, sometimes employed in this sense. They were citizens of Heaven, not of Earth; and they realised the fact to an extent not often equalled.
But with all her ‘Other-worldliness,’ Miss Tucker never lost the sense of fun and humour, as connected with the things of this world. One amusing little incident is told of the Bishop’s visit. He had brought with him a Muhammadan manservant. Miss Tucker habitually kept in her cupboard a small bottle of brandy, in case of need,—the brandy being well dosed with quinine, to render it unattractive. When the Bishop was gone, this little bottle was found to have vanished also. Miss Tucker, on making the discovery, went back to her friends, to exclaim, with an indescribable expression, ‘That greedy Muhammadan has taken the brandy?’—then bursting into a fit of laughter at the thought of his surprise on tasting the quinine. She often referred to this afterwards with great amusement.